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Deep grooves creased my forehead. “You’ve lost, girl. Just like I’m sure you planned.” I grabbed her arm to spin her around, and she shrugged me off. I hissed. Why is she acting so quiet and dismissive? Isn’t this what she’s always wanted?
Frustration grew inside me at being rebuffed again, and I decided I’d take what I wanted. She loved it when I was rough like that. Perhaps she is playing out a fantasy.
I grabbed her arm and shoved her to the ground, falling with her and putting a hand under her back to catch her—knocking the wind out of her lungs yet not harming a hair on her perfect body.
I straddled her waist, bearing down on her with a savage grin. “Give it up, little thorn. I know you love—”
My voice cut off on a gasp. The face staring up at me was terrified, eyes bulging. “What the . . .”
I threw the hood back—
And stared down at the frightened face of Ada, one of the girls we’d rescued from Rufford Abbey.
Distraught, shocked, and rattled, I threw myself off her, backing up and smacking into a tree trunk. All decorum lost. My cheeks paled. “What is the meaning of this?”
Ada sat up. “I-I don’t know, Sir Scarlet! She just told me to w-walk out this way. And keep walking.”
“Robin did?”
“Aye, sir.”
“When?” I growled.
“An hour ago, perhaps? She asked me to wait until now.”
Fuck. I snarled, “You’re safe, girl. Go back to camp.”
I only paused long enough to help her to her feet, and then I was rushing back to the glade.
One of the night watchmen was rounding the periphery as I burst in, hearing me tearing through the woods—caution and stealth thrown to the wind. He froze when he saw the wrathful expression on my face.
I barged into Little John’s tent first. “John!” I growled, for once hoping that I’d find her in here.
He was dead asleep. Alone. When he heard my voice, he sat up abruptly with a bleary face, looking like he didn’t even know what country we were in.
The man had been sleeping soundly.
“What is it, Will?” he asked in a raspy voice.
“I think we have a problem.”
His brow furrowed and he jumped up as I exited the tent and headed for Alan’s.
Funnily enough, Alan was leaving my tent, which both confused me and would have made me laugh in any other situation.
“Ah, there you are,” the golden-haired minstrel said with a smile as I approached. Then he saw the look on my face and frowned. “You don’t look like you’re in the mood for a quick romp.” His head tilted, “Or is that the angry look you give when you want to fuck? It’s so hard to tell which angry face—”
“Shut the fuck up, Alan. Have you seen Robin?”
He blinked. Thumbed over his shoulder. “Erm. Aye. In her tent, sleeping like a log.”
I shoved him out of my trajectory and marched past him. “Horseshit.”
He followed me, with John close behind. Other Merry Men were starting to complain and wake from the ruckus I was causing.
I desperately hoped Alan was right. That I had been wrong in my assumption for once—of what Robin wanted—and I could tell everyone it was a false alarm and to go back to bed.
My gut told me I wasn’t wrong.
